Free Republic

Newt Gingrich had a message for rivals Santorum and Romney at a campaign event in his native Georgia Friday: bawk bawk bawkkkk. After two people dressed in chicken suits entertained the crowd, holding a sign reading “I’m Chicken to Debate Newt,” Gingrich hit his rivals for backing out of a CNN-sponsored debate that had been scheduled for March 1 but was canceled after Santorum, Romney and Paul of Texas said they would not attend. “I’m going to ask them to reconsider and come to Georgia. It’ll be just fine,” Gingrich told an audience of about 400 gathered in an airplane...

Newt challenged Mitt Romney to debate him on the lies Romney's attack ads are spewing out over the airways in Iowa. America Live, on FOX News, just now (1:08 p.m. CST), questioned Romney about it and asked if he would accept the Speaker's challenge to debate. Surprise, surprise; Romney said that as long as there are still other candidates in the race, he must respect them and not debate without them. WHAT A LOW-LIFE, LYING, SCUMMY COWARD MITT ROMNEY IS!!!

Make what you will of this, but National Journal's Reid Wilson is reporting that Mitt Romney and his team are thinking about sitting out next year's Iowa caucuses: Though there is no official campaign, and no strategy decisions have been finalized, Romney’s team has considered running a very different race from the last one. After Romney spent millions of dollars and a huge chunk of time in Iowa, only to finish behind former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee, his strategists have spoken with potential consultants about the prospect of skipping Iowa altogether this time and launching a campaign from New Hampshire....

The Massachusetts treasurer said Tuesday that Congress will "threaten to wipe out the American economy within four years" if it adopts a health care overhaul modeled after the Bay State's. Treasurer Timothy Cahill - a former Democrat running as an independent for governor - said the 2006 law has succeeded only because of huge subsidies and favorable regulatory changes from the federal government.